Christy: Fall Running Strong
Ocheyedan, Iowa: The clouds cleared, and we have had a green light for the last few weeks. Beans are wrapped up, and corn harvest is underway. We are so grateful for the great weather. Days are still warm but look to start cooling off.
Bean harvest went fast and stayed steady after the prior two weeks of rain. The weather has been great, finally, and everyone is out harvesting. That means lines at the coops and bean plants have been long. Wait times have been a bit frustrating. When we started on some of our own beans by Terrill, Iowa one of the first trucks up to Fairmont, Minnesota, had 50 trucks ahead. The weather has played such a large part in the race to get beans out in a timely manner, but I’m glad we have that done so we can move on to corn.
Soybeans were great in places, averaging 90 plus bushels per acre in some fields, to anywhere from 50 to 80 for the most part. Overall, I think it’s a good year for beans. Corn is doing well so far and looks like it’ll be averaging between 200 to 250 bushels per acre.
Right now, we’re running two AF 9’s in corn, and they are just blasting through it. It’s taking two grain carts per machine to keep up. At the rate we’re going now, and if the weather holds out, I think we could still see harvest ending for us around the first week of November, or close.
I have been busy turning meals out as fast as I can. Right now, I’m feeding anywhere from about 14 during lunch, and about 17 for supper. Between soybeans and corn, we did have one rain day where I grilled steaks for our crew. They didn’t complain, and there definitely wasn’t anything left. It’s very time consuming preparing and delivering two meals a day to crews. But at the end of the day, even if the meal isn’t more than a meat and potatoe, it’s generally better than anything from the station or fast food.
Our season overall has turned out to be a lot better than first predicted. We did have a drop in wheat acres over the summer, and the unrelenting rain delayed us, but we still covered enough to ground to keep us going. As long as fall harvest continues to progress as it has so far, we should end up decently for the year. It’s been a difficult year for harvesters, and farmers alike. Looking forward, I hope conditions can change and improve for an overall success. Hope everyone has a safe and great harvest.
